Shynola and Reznor: Survival of the Fittest

Trent Rezor’s new project How To Destroy Angels was the perfect opportunity to fulfill his longstanding desire to work with visual arts collective Shynola. The result, a short film set to HTDA’s single “How Long,” paints a haunting future where civilization relies on survival of the fittest. It’s an appropriately eerie scene for the song’s throbbing electronic vibe, as HTDA’s singer (and Reznor’s wife) Mariqueen Maandiq repeats “How long can we keep holding on?”

For his part Trent Reznor says: “[Shynola's] work is visually striking and consistently stands out. When we started talking about possible directors to work with for ‘How long,’ their name came up right away. It’s been an honor to finally work with them, and to get their wholly unique interpretation of the themes we’ve been exploring with this record and this song.”

Represented by Black Dog Films, the legendary visual collective Shynola explained the collaboration between Reznor’s team and themselves, “we had a great conversation where the band articulated their ideas about modern identity, the effect of technology on culture and our inability to connect with others.”

The outcome is, perhaps not surprisingly, a bleak vision of a dystopian future, with some seriously haunting imagery. We dare you to watch all the way though.